By Drew V. Founded by the Philadelphia twins and businessmen Karl and Walther Boeselager, the Philadelphia Brewers are a founding LBL powerhouse currently dominating the Liberty Division. Originally a supplier of the 1883 Philadelphia Athletics, the pair owned a large brewery operation in Philadelphia, founded by their father, Wilhelm. The Boeselagers lost the original bid…
Team Introduction: The New York Kings
Written by Brendan H. Bread and circuses? The pursuit of great wealth at all costs, unscrupulous though the methods may have been had been a successful one for Alexander Bingley. The son of an Episcopalian clergyman, the native New Yorker had treated the accumulation of vast sums of capital as his divine right throughout his…
Team Introduction: The Boston Banshees
“In the end, his mother told him, it was the wailing that took his father. A pox on their family. After each joyous beginning, the wailing would consume him until the silent, stillbirth would drown the fairy’s cries with its gurgling, violent emptiness. The cycle continued, unabated, like the tide—day giving way to night. At…
Team Introduction: The Providence Angels
Written by Drew V. The life work of sporting enthusiast and Superior Court Judge Jacob Cartwright, the Providence angels are a successful and strait-laced ballclub who play in the scenic center of Roger Williams Park on “Angel Island.” A successful lawyer, respected judge and soft-spoken Roman Catholic deacon, Jacob Cartwright purchased the center of Roger…
Team Introduction: The Chicago Doves
Written by Brendan H. Located in Jackson Park on the south side of Chicago, at the site of 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition, stands a neoclassical ballfield with a white façade and an elaborate presentation. Home of the Chicago Doves, World Fair Field, with its Beaux-Arts design, stands as a gleaming pearl of American Exceptionalism and…
Team Introduction: The Baltimore Clippers
On a low foundation of a long-collapsed paint factory, Carroway Field lies along the Patapsco River’s inner harbor near downtown Baltimore. Named for its founding owner, painting supply magnate Edward Carroway, the elegant ballpark sports grandiose and iconic “witch’s hat” grandstands overlooking the Inner Harbor. Like the high-sailed and fast-paced ships for which they are…
Team Introduction: The Richmond Rifles
The LBL’s only current “southern” ballclub, the Richmond Rifles represent a remnant of the once-prestigious “Cotton Belt” clubs, long-since scattered into disarray following the collapse of the National League. A visionary project of the prominent Virginia tobacco magnate Michael J. Monroe, the Rifles of Richmond are a proud and aging ballclub of former greats among…
Team Introduction: The Brooklyn Whales
Written by Brendan H. Woefully disorganized, the LBL’s Brooklyn squad was hastily chartered just prior to the formation of the league. With the local talent mostly claimed by their peers in Manhattan, Brooklyn was forced to build a team mostly from whatever players were left over. Upon first seeing the team—an amalgamation of spare parts,…
Legacy Times 1.1: April 25th, 1895
Sporting Times: Rumor of a New League Sparks Hope
Thursday, November 11, 1894 Manhattan, New York Since the collapse of the National League in 1891, the future of organized baseball in America lies cowled in most agitating uncertainty. Several herculean obstacles lay before the feet of many organizations vying for control of a “national” baseball organization—the greatest of which is organizing the funds and…